From a saunter to a sprint, specialized brain cells keep track of a rat’s swiftness, scientists report July 15 in Nature. These “speed cells” may be a missing piece in understanding how animals and people navigate the world, says neuroscientist Michael Hausser of University College London.

Scientists have previously uncovered cadres of brain cells that help an animal constantly...

For millennia, humans have harnessed the power of clocks to schedule prayers, guide ocean voyages and, lately, to chart the universe. Whatever their use, all clocks need two basic components: a constant repetitive action (like a pendulum’s swing or an atom’s vibrations) and a way to mark time’s progression.

Quarks, the elementary units of matter found in every atomic nucleus, are surprisingly comfortable in large crowds.

Two particles discovered at the Large Hadron Collider, or LHC, near Geneva are each composed of five quarks, researchers report online July 13 at arXiv.org. Until recently, quarks had only been found in pairs or trios. Now, in...

It may look sweet and fuzzy. But make no mistake. It’s a cold, calculated murderer.

The assassin, a common fungus called Beauveria bassiana, slays with a vast arsenal of chemical weapons, leaving corpses in a fluffy white shroud (including the caterpillar above). And like any trained killer, it quickly moves on to the next victim. “If you’ve got six to eight legs, it is going to...

Water flows best when it’s chock-full of synchronized-swimming bacteria.

By coaxing billions of E. coli to work together, French researchers got a small sample of a bacteria-laden solution to have no resistance to flow, or zero viscosity. Such effortless motion is usually reserved for superfluids like liquid helium that are kept at frigid temperatures.